The first day of school in the Bronx in 2018. Over the past five years, the temperature in debates about education policy has dropped.

“If (the public) understood what was happening with education to their children, there would be an outrage in this city,” Gov. Andrew Cuomo told the Daily News editorial board in January 2015. “They would take City Hall down brick by brick.”

This was one of many attacks Cuomo leveled on public education as he moved from his first to second term. As he embraced much of what came to be seen as the education-reform agenda, he championed charter schools, supported a tax credit for families whose children attended religious schools, sought to link teacher evaluations to student scores on standardized tests and pledged fealty to the state’s most controversial charter-school network, Eva Moskowitz’s Success Academy. “He has declared war on the public schools,” said Karen Magee, then president of the state teachers union, New York State United Teachers.

In the city, Mayor Bill de Blasio leapt into the fray denying space in Department of Education buildings to a few of Moskowitz’s charters and branding some of the existing space-sharing arrangements as “abhorrent.” People on both sides of the education debates accused the other of not caring about poor Black and Brown children. Some charter-school opponents spoke darkly of backdoor real-estate deals, while supporters portrayed unionized teachers as lazy, greedy or both.

What a difference four years can make. As he again runs for re-election, Cuomo has dropped the anti-public school rhetoric. Meanwhile, de Blasio has appointed a new schools chancellor, Richard Carranza, who has pledged to work with charter schools and visited some of them in his first weeks on the job.

New York seems to be in the midst of a lull in its education wars. The defeat of many charter school advocates in last week’s Democratic primary elections seems like to continue – and deepen – the de-escalation.

While the apparent hiatus has many causes, it remains to be seen what effect the change in tone will have over long-standing disputes about controversial issues such as charter schools, education funding and the role of testing.

Whatever the reasons, many are glad tempers have cooled. “The issues are still there but folks have toned down the rhetoric, which is good,” says Steven Zimmerman, co-director of the Coalition of Community Charter Schools (C3S), which represents individually operated charter schools.

Charles Sahm of the Manhattan Institute agrees: “I’m glad that both sides have stepped back a little it seems, and declared a truce in the education wars. There’s a lot of common ground and good people on both sides.”

Teachers as ‘enemy number one’

While education has frequently been a fraught topic in New York – the clash over community control in Ocean-Hill Brownsville sparked a citywide teachers strike in 1968 – the most recent round kicked off when Joel Klein arrived as New York City schools chancellor in 2002. Vowing to “break some china,” Klein, who had essentially no education experience and was the first chancellor appointed under mayoral control of city schools, publicly derided career educators, closed dozens of venerable – but, he said, failing – schools, and championed charters.

Under Klein, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and later Cuomo, New York was seen as the vanguard of the so-called education-reform movement, which supported charters, weakening of tenure protection for teachers, and standardized testing. Throughout the country, Democrats as well as Republicans sat in harsh judgement of public education. Arne Duncan, President Obama’s education secretary, hailed Hurricane Katrina’s leveling of many schools as “the best thing that happened to the education system in New Orleans.” Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker targeted salaries, benefits and collective bargaining by many public employees, including, notably, teachers— sparking sit-ins in the state capital in Madison. Washington, D.C.’s then school superintendent Michelle Rhee posed for the cover of Time magazine holding a broom symbolizing her desire to sweep out lots of teachers.

“It was the public rhetoric. It was making teachers public enemy number one…. When Wall Street crashed, we were the focus of that. It was bizarre,” says Jolene di Brango, executive vice president of New York State United Teachers (NYSUT), the state teachers union.

So, what has changed?

Jasmine Gripper, director of state advocacy for the Alliance for Quality Education, a state advocacy group that has clashed frequently with the governor over school funding and other issues, believes the anti-public school rhetoric was bound to fail. “We demonized teachers, but it wasn’t relatable to a lot of parents. Most parents love their child’s teacher,” she says

Di Brango thinks teachers boosted their cause when they walked out of classrooms in West Virginia, Arizona and Oklahoma last spring. She says, “These were walkouts for their students and it really raised awareness” of the damage the anti-school rhetoric had done.

The Trump factor

Certainly, the education reform movement in New York – and much of the nation – no longer holds the influence it once did. Many of the measures it pushed for did not produce the kind of successes people had hoped they would, as low achievement persisted in many schools, particularly those with large numbers of students living in poverty. Though many charters thrived, scandals and poor performance plagued others – particularly for-profit and online-only schools. Cheating and “dumbing down” of tests and graduation requirements cast doubts on the data so prized by many school reformers.

Then last year, one of the most high-profile pro-education reform groups, Families for Excellent Schools—which was closely aligned with Moskowitz—crashed and burned after suffering a humiliating defeat at the polls in Massachusetts and being charged with campaign finance violations. Its leader was fired in the wake of a sexual harassment accusation, and shortly thereafter the organization shut its doors. Even some charter advocates think FES’ demise has been beneficial. “FES being out of the equation is good for everything,” says Zimmerman.

The woes for charters continued this year. Stories highlighted problems at Success Academy, particularly at its high school, where students chafed at rules, teacher turnover was high and Moskowitz resorted to having her son, who had not yet completed college, teach an advanced economics class.

Then on Thursday six members of the State Senate’s former Independent Democratic Conference, who allied themselves with state Republicans, were defeated by more progressive challengers. Although charters were not a big issue in the races, pro charter groups gave heavily to many of incumbents, notably IDC leader Jeff Klein. It seems likely that charter schools – and education reform overall – will have less influence in Albany next year. This will almost certainly lead to a less combative environment on many education issues.

The events in New York continue what Michael Petrilli, president of the pro-reform Thomas B. Fordham Institute, has described as a national “pause on state-driven reform.” In an email before the election, he said this “is not entirely a bad thing—it gives local districts a chance to focus on implementation of past reforms.”

Other factors have contributed to the apparent truce in New York, and that includes Donald Trump. Nicole Brisbane of Democrats for Education Reform, which supports charter schools and testing, says Democrats, though sharply split on education, may shy away from education battles because they want to present a united front against the president. “The moment now is really about Trump and fighting Trump, and education is too divisive,” she says.

Trump may be figuring into Cuomo’s less-combative stance as well. “Cuomo sees 2020 as an opportunity to run for national office and wants to run as a progressive, so he has to do something. He’s trying not to speak about education,” says Gripper. (In a debate with Democratic primary opponent Cynthia Nixon, Cuomo pledged to remain as governor if re-elected this year.)

Other than sometimes touting his controversial Excelsior college scholarship program, Cuomo has been largely silent on education of late. “He’s stepping away from his stands because he had been getting hammered in the polls” largely due to some of his education positions, says Carol Burris, the former principal of a Long Island high school who now serves as executive director of the Network for Public Education. She adds, though, that Cuomo has not explicitly reversed himself. “I’m not sure he’s not playing the same song in his head,” Burris says.

In prepared comments in his 2012 State of the State address, Cuomo declared himself so focused on education that he would “take on a second job — consider me the lobbyist for the students. I will wage a campaign to put students first.”

Within a few years, however, he seemed to lose interest in that second job. Earlier this month, it was widely reported that the governor, in return for an endorsement from a leading rabbi, had promised not to interfere with ultra-Orthodox Jewish religious schools in the state that do not meet state requirements to provide their students with a basic secular education. Asked about the alleged deal, Cuomo told reporters, “I have no control of the state Education Department.”

Although the governor does not appoint the state’s top education officials, until recently those holding the posts shared many of the views he was espousing. Merryl Tisch, former chancellor of the state board of Regents, and John King, the state education commissioner who went on to be acting U.S. Secretary of Education, championed charter schools, high-stakes testing, Common Core and other mainstays of the education reform agenda. Both have left those posts, replaced respectively by Betty Rosa, a longtime educator in Manhattan and the Bronx, and MaryEllen Elia, the former superintendent of the Hillsborough, Fla., school system.

“Betsy Rosa is not the lightening rod that Merryl Tisch was and MaryEllen Elia is not the lightening rod that John King was,” says Burris. “The style of leadership in Albany is a very different style. You no longer have leaders like John King and Merryl Tisch saying kids just need to jump in at the deep end of the pool.”

A new chancellor in town

Meanwhile the city’s new schools chancellor seems to be winning praise from both sides. Burris, for example calls him “fabulous,” while Sahm says Carranza “has said all the right things.”

Thorny issues remain, though. Although education has not been front and center in the state campaign so far—the debate between Cuomo and Nixon did not include a single question on education – it has been a factor. In contrast to Cuomo’s silence on education, for example, Nixon frequently cited her background as a product of New York City public schools, a public school activist and the parent of children who have attended public schools.

Overall, Susan Kang of the campaign group No IDC NY, said before the primary that she thinks education, particularly the issue of resources, works in favor of progressives challenging more conservative Democrats, such as members of the Independent Democratic Conference. “Funding has resonance across different demographic groups and motivates people who might otherwise not think about voting,” she says. “It’s able to bring in a diverse collation.”

Although Cuomo boasts of having increased school funding, critics like the Alliance for Quality Education argue the state has never fulfilled its obligation under the Campaign for Fiscal Equity suit, which found that New York’s funding formula for public education violated students’ state constitutional rights to a sound, basic education.

Charter challenge evolves

While the intensity of the charter school issue has faded, the publicly funded, privately run schools remain a flashpoint for many. “Charter schools have a pretty big constituency, so maybe there’s less need for them to be so outspoken,” Sahm says, adding, “de Blasio does deserve credit. In the past few years, [his administration] toned down the rhetoric and actively engaged the charter community.”

Few, if any, critics call for shutting down existing, well-performing charters. “Charters are here to stay because hundreds of thousands of parents choose to send their children here,” Zimmerman says.

Despite that, critics, such as Burris and NYSUT argue the emphasis should remain on the traditional public schools that most New York children attend. They remain wary of giving charters space in traditional public schools, seek to limit the number of charter schools and urge strict oversight of the charters.

In Albany, the argument tends to revolve around the cap – the limit on how many charter schools can operate in the state. Even the cap, though, has become less of an issue than it once was as the rate of growth in the number of charter schools has slowed and, according to NYSUT, the existing limits allow for 28 additional charters in New York City alone. A bid to raise the cap failed in the last legislative session, and if the Democrats who won on Thursday end up in Albany next year, any further effort to raise it seem doomed to failure.

Many charter supporters concede their position is not as strong as it was in the days when the pro-charter movie Waiting for Superman had its theatrical release, Moskowitz was touted as a future mayor of New York, and Cuomo appeared at pro-charter rallies. Fairly or not, the losses of the IDC members supported by Democrats for Education Reform and New Yorkers for Putting Students First will be seen as another sign of waning support for charters. (Cuomo also received financial support from pro-charter groups.)

Ironically charters, once seen as the beacon for school choice, have been tarnished by the Trump administration and Education Secretary Betsy De Vos’ support for more radical school choice policies, especially the idea of giving parents vouchers they can “spend” at private, even religious, schools.

“It has gotten easier for people on the progressive side of the spectrum to describe what we’re doing as privatization,” says Zimmerman. “It’s very, very easy to characterize charters as being on the wrong side of history. That’s just a shame.”

Columbia University Teachers College Professor Jeffrey Henig says that De Vos has created a dilemma for the charter community. “Some proponents of choice are as worried about vouchers and the Betsy De Vos-type of initiatives as they are about the public-school bureaucracy and teacher unions,” he says. This has forced what he describes as “moderate choice people” to “lower the visibility of their claims against the traditional sector.”

Testing’s retreat

Standardized testing – and how it was is used – has served as another fault line in the education battles. Those allied with education reform not only believe in standardized tests but have called for the tests being used to evaluate teachers and screen students for schools. The furor over such high-stakes tests fueled much of the opposition to the Common Core learning standards in New York state and launched the opt-out movement, which, according to advocates, saw 20 percent of students in the state not take their standardized tests in 2017.

The national push for high-stakes tests waned when the pro-testing Obama administration left Washington. In New York, opt-out advocates won changes in the tests – and in how they were used. Next Generation Learning Standards replaced the Common Core in New York, while on the national level, the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) replaced No Child Left Behind. Neither of the new regimes has proved nearly as controversial as its predecessor.

Proponents of high-stakes testing suffered a setback this month when the state Department of Education withdrew a proposed section of New York’s ESSA plan that would have withheld some federal funding from schools where more than 5 percent of students opt out of state standardized tests. Federal law requires a 95 percent participation rate but gives states leeway in how states insure that. New York is currently proposing less draconian measures than withholding funds.

During the comment period that ended last month, state Education Department said it received about 1,900 comments on its ESSA plan, most of which were on the opt-out provisions. NYSUT had strongly criticized the proposed change, saying any problems with the state’s testing system would not be solved by enacting “regulations to punish parents for opting their children out of the tests.”

In announcing the reversal, State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia said in a statement..“Following a thoughtful and productive discussion and considering the comments received, I am confident these changes will benefit students across the state.”

NYSUT hailed the change. “No school should face any sanction — or the stigma of being placed on a state list of academically deficient schools — because parents refuse to have their children take flawed and misused state standardized tests,” the union said in a statement.

Testing also comes into play in the debate over teacher evaluations. In 2015, Cuomo decried the existing system, calling evaluations “baloney.” “How can 38 percent of students be ready and 98 percent of the teachers rated effective?” he asked. To fix it, he called for basing 50 percent of a teacher’s evaluation on standardized test results. In the wake of protests from teachers and some parents, Cuomo backed away from his position, and the legislature blocked the use of test scores in the evaluations. That moratorium expires in 2019. So far, though, nothing has taken its place.

“The state kicked the can down the road,” Burris said says, noting “it’s still in limbo.” She adds, “The governor made this mess, so he needs to clean it up.”

Re-igniting over race?

As the state must grapple with these issues, it could see its truce on education collapse in face of the 1,000-pound gorilla that political leaders have all but ignored for decades—school segregation. The much-referenced UCLA civil rights report that called New York’s school system the most segregated in the nation actually was referring to the state, not just the city, and one of the researchers described Long Island at as “one of the most segregated and fragmented suburban rings in the country.”

The issue could reach the legislature in the form of de Blasio’s proposal to do away with the single test that determines admission to eight of the city’s top academic high schools. For now, few people see that measure of having much chance of passage. But the strong feelings about that test underscore why any truce in New York’s education wars will likely be short lived.

“The conversations about education are at the root about our society and equity and that makes them very intense,” says Brisbane. “The challenge in education becomes what my kid is getting versus what your kid is getting.”

Success Academy founder Eva Moskowitz, seen at a 2010 appearance. She first proposed the policy shift, the author says.

This fall, Eva Moskowitz, the face of charter schools in New York, proved that if you spread enough PAC money around Albany, you can do amazing things, for example inventing special new “shortcut” teaching licenses, just for your charter network. But is it legal?

The State University of New York (SUNY) system has some of the best colleges in the state for Education (seven SUNY schools are ranked in the top twenty here), particularly for the cost, less than half the tuition of comparable universities. So it might seem bizarre SUNY would eliminate its own well-respected education degrees from requirements for teaching in SUNY charter schools. But that’s just what they did.

On October 11, the five trustees of the SUNY Charter School committee, comprised of Governor Andrew Cuomo appointees (and former Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch), voted to allow SUNY charter schools to waive state requirements for teacher certification and hire unlicensed teachers without education degrees. They also invented a new type of teaching license, only valid within the SUNY charter network (which serves over 80 percent students in poverty).

A day later, a lawsuit was filed by New York State United Teachers (NYSUT), joined by the New York City union, the United Federation of Teachers (UFT), quoting statutory language that requires charters to have comparable certification to other schools.

Scores’ validity in doubt

On the day the policy was unveiled, video captured a heated exchange as attendees characterized the policy as “racist”. Joseph Belluck, the chair of the SUNY charter school committee, a prominent asbestos lawyer (and $150,000 Cuomo donor), moved the proposal forward, declaring that superior student outcomes, gauged by standardized Math and ELA test scores, will allow SUNY charter schools a new license-issuing privilege, irrespective of which teachers in which subjects contributed to a school’s high scores.

The use of student test scores in high stakes decisions was already a sore point, motivating one fifth of New York parents to boycott the annual state tests for the last three years. The missing data has made school comparisons across the state even less accurate.

Using controversial Common Core scores to claim “superiority” is also brazen in light of a statewide moratorium on the use of state test scores for educator rankings. Annual Professional Performance Review (APPR) has sat in legal limbo since the state lost a lawsuit to Long Island teacher Sheri Lederman. The case exposed that “invisible” formulas were behind the state’s widely lambasted teacher evaluation system. In 2016, Lederman’s disputed “growth score” rating was ruled “arbitrary and capricious” in NY Supreme Court and APPR was subsequently suspended for four years, with a promised review now months overdue.

Just one week after SUNY announced this policy, a federal court in Texas also ruled test-based rankings invalid. In the Texas case, it was decided that any test-based formulas or proprietary “computer codes” that are invisible to teachers are “unverifiable” and therefore unconstitutional. New York’s test-based ranking algorithms are just as invisible.

Scores count even more

In major contention since 2011 is whether student test scores can reliably measure instructor quality apart from privilege or any number of other factors. SUNY Charter institute Executive Director Susie Miller Carello told the Washington Post:

“The best definitions of high quality teachers center on how well students who spend a year with that teacher grow in their abilities and confidence to read, write, know history, mathematics, science and the arts. More than 80 percent of SUNY charters outperform the districts in which they are located. Should any SUNY charter have the opportunity to establish a SUNY charter school teacher certification program, the strength of such a program will directly link to how well students perform.”

Although Carello mentions history and the arts, state tests are not given in these subjects (science is tested twice between grades 3-8), so the words don’t match the reality. Charter advocates are linking teacher quality to state test results in only two subjects when there is no reliable correlation. A recent Forbes article by scientist Ethan Siegel reinforces this.

Since most teachers do not teach the tested subjects of Math and English Language Arts (ELA), their school’s scores say little about their practice. SUNY charter schools with high Math and ELA scores will nonetheless issue licenses in all subject areas. But even for probationary Math and English teachers, their students’ scores are averaged in with others, diluting their impact and making the pseudo-science behind the policy a quantum leap of faith.

In short, SUNY schools can now hire anyone, regardless of qualification, into a school with good Math and ELA scores. Administrators from schools “in good standing” will be the arbiters of who gets permanent SUNY-only licenses—even if those administrators have no certifications, degrees or training in Education themselves.

Worse still, there is no requirement for prospective teachers to hold a bachelor’s degree, to pass the state’s general teaching or content-specific exams, or to have student teaching experience. It’s also not indicated anywhere that new hires are even required to have a high school diploma.

Race not a factor?

Belluck said he took umbrage to statements posted on Twitter pointing out that children of color would be even less likely now to have a certified teacher under his new rules. Belluck warned critics he would strike their comments: “…[E]mailing and attacks on twitter are probably not the best way to get your points across to be considered as part of the record…”

Indeed, public comments were sent to Belluck’s committee during a 45-day period, but results have not been made public. Earlier, Belluck had committed to “…a real process, but I would encourage people not to start from a place of lobbing insults and characterizations about people’s character, it’s not a good place to start. We will consider everything…”

Belluck touted that his teacher policy will increase teacher diversity, promising that more teachers of color will be recruited by his charter schools to be given the special SUNY-only licenses. He blamed current teacher certification requirements for the teacher shortage, and the lack of diversity in the field. But charter school officials tell a different story. From an op-ed in the NY Times in support of the SUNY policy:

“New York’s high-performing charter schools have long complained that rules requiring them to hire state-certified teachers make it difficult to find high-quality applicants in high-demand specialties like math, science and special education. They tell of sorting through hundreds of candidates to fill a few positions, only to find that the strongest candidates have no interest in working in the low-income communities where charters are typically located.”

Dueling interpretations

Responding to the Times, NY State Regents Chancellor Betty Rosa called out the “flawed” op-ed, saying the policy undermines SUNY’s own traditional certification program, TeachNY.

New York State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia agreed, pointing out that SUNY’s policy bumps up against Education Law §3004(1), Part 52 of the Commissioner’s Regulations, granting the Commissioner the sole, exclusive authority to change certification regulations or approve teacher certification programs.

The matter is due in court (with taxpayers, students and teachers paying the legal bills) as the policy challenges Article 56 of the NY State Education law. From the UFT: “Article 56 requires that the board of trustees of a charter school, with minimal exceptions, employs teachers who “shall be certified in accordance with the requirements applicable to other public schools.”

To win, Belluck will try to convince the court that he was granted “incredibly broad authority” to “make rules and regulations related to the operations of charter schools” as part of the 2016 budget bill, even though nothing in last year’s law mentions teacher certification. The relevant section in the bill passed by both the State Senate and Assembly says only that the SUNY trustees in the charter committee are “authorized and empowered, to promulgate regulations with respect to governance, structure and operations”.

Belluck admitted early on these vague powers are limited in cases where they bump up against existing law, which they clearly appear to do. So how can he just ignore Article 56 and Part 52 of the Commissioner’s Regulations? He has a note, it seems.

In June of 2016, Republican NYS Senate Leader John Flanagan senta letter to Governor Cuomo touting SUNY charters’ high Math and ELA scores, and recommending new flexibility around teacher licensing requirements. In the letter however, Flanagan, who supports Trump and Betsy DeVos, never actually said teachers should skip traditional certification:

“Like all schools around the state, charter schools have been hit hard by a dramatic and abrupt teacher shortage. Allowing these schools flexibility on the rigid certification requirements will enable these schools to continue to function at their high levels of success. The Charter Institute should immediately act to provide a path for highly educated mid-career or college graduates to become certified teachers over a period of time.”

Flanagan’s letter was only made public after the bill passed, leaving lawmakers in sharp dispute over the meaning of the bill’s charter language. Soon after, Assembly Majority Speaker Carl Heastie and Education Committee Chair Cathie Nolan sent their own letter to Governor Cuomo, insisting that the language in the bill did not give SUNY any powers to change teacher certification requirements.

Special needs and secret deals

It was Eva Moskowitz who first proposed the policy, ultimately pushed through on a 4-1 vote in October because Moskowitz was “churning” through as many as sixty percent of the teachers in her Success Academy schools every year. In an interview, SUNY chair Joe Belluck said the current teacher shortage is an “emergency” that requires immediate action, but he didn’t explain why SUNY’s 185 charter schools should receive any advantages to attract recruits that the other 4,275 schools in the state cannot get.

Belluck also asserted that his policy is legal because it’s “identical to their alternative pathway, called Transitional B. The requirements match up 100 percent with their requirements.”

Not so. The Transitional B program, used often by Teach For America, requires a bachelor’s degree to apply. SUNY’s new policy does not. As implied by the name, a Transitional B certificate is temporary and expires within three years. To obtain a permanent license, a Transitional B holder must pass state teaching tests, and complete an eventual Master’s degree. Belluck’s policy does not match up with this at all.

Politico’s Eliza Shapiro reported in July that NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio appears to have consented to the SUNY charter policy in an unwritten “side deal” with leader Flanagan renewing mayoral control for two years.

Flanagan, who held the renewal “hostage” throughout the 2017 budget process, was asked if his pro-charter stance was influenced by millions of dollars donated to him and his Republican conference by billionaires like Alice Walton or Puerto Rico “debt vultures” Dan Loeb and Paul Singer. Mr. Flanagan said through a spokesman: “Campaign contributions have no effect whatsoever.” Just a few weeks later, in August, Flanagan checked into a rehab for problems with alcohol.

Into the rat race

According to the language of the proposal, a charter school, (which they call a “SUNY corporation”) gets teacher-licensing privileges provided 60 percent of it’s schools have higher exam scores than neighboring district schools. This language actually codifies competition, meaning there is not just incentive for schools to do well, but also to bet against or even sabotage the competition. High schools need to meet only 60 percent of the measures in it’s own accountability plan, made with SUNY. Next, note this shifty language:

“For schools that primarily serve a special population, including students with disabilities or ELL students, the schools must have performed better than the students of the applicable special population in the school districts in which the charter schools are located;”

Catch that? Here they compare test scores from charter schools (a school wide average) with the test scores of 100 percent disabled public school students across the district. To game this, a SUNY school can mix in ringer test-takers with as few as 51 percent disabled students and win teacher-licensing status.

Belluck has repeatedly avoided the question of charter school cherrypicking in an enrollment process that weeds out 50 percent of lottery winners, the most “at-risk” students, only to then criticize the public schools who accept them. This suggests SUNY as a state charter authorizer is not mindful of the 1998 NY Charter Law (S 2850) that first created charter schools.

The law says charters must place “special emphasis” on students at-risk of failure, something most charters do not do. Right from the start, charters contravened the law by recruiting families with more involved parents. This has intentionally widened achievement gaps, and thus, charters have superior test scores, provided one ignores differences in student populations.

Belluck’s role therefore is tricky. He is being asked to persuade a court to legislate from the bench, finding that the budget 2016 law means something it doesn’t say. And the justification for letting SUNY charters “innovate” and experiment with uncertified teachers will all be based on the school’s test scores, meaning the court will have to accept that standardized test results are a valid measure of teacher quality.

Some argue SUNY could better address both the teacher shortage and diversity imbalance by expanding free tuition for education students. But Belluck’s plan is designed to intensify competition, to produce winners and losers, intentionally widening achievement gaps in a battle for students, resources, and now, teacher recruits.

After some last-minute drama, Mayor de Blasio has retained control of New York City schools—and now state legislators have joined the city’s nearly 1 million public school kids on summer vacation.

But while the fight over mayoral control is over—for the moment at least—the larger debate over the direction of the city’s schools rolls on.

This week on BRIC’s BkLive we brought together three education policy experts and advocates to discuss what issues they feel most need attention as the city prepares for the 2017-18 school year and the 2017 municipal elections: Charles Sahm, director of education policy at the Manhattan Institute; Clara Hemphill, director of Education Policy and Insideschools at the Center for New York City Affairs and Zakiyah Ansari, advocacy director at the Alliance for Quality Education.

Ansari emphasized the continuing need for the state to more adequately fund city schools. Hemphill focused on the importance of attracting and retaining talented principals. And Sahm suggested a common school assignment system pooling charters and regular public schools.

One question we wrestled with: Is the lower profile of education issues under Mayor de Blasio a problem, or an asset?

As a New Yorker, I know the value of a good education, and as a mom, it’s my job is to make sure my kids have access to one. But finding a school that works for my family hasn’t always been easy because both of my sons were diagnosed with learning disabilities. New York public schools are not equipped to meet the unique needs of disabled children, a problem that is even worse in New York’s communities of color. That’s why I was relieved to learn that the city was stalled in its efforts to shut down the middle school at Opportunity Charter School (OCS), a school specifically designed to help children with disabilities and a learning difficulties.

This year, the Department of Education (DOE) granted a three-year renewal for OCS’s high school, but ordered the middle school to close down. The DOE claims our test scores aren’t high enough, but these results don’t tell the whole story, especially in a school like ours that disproportionately serves students with special needs. Fortunately, the judge overseeing our appeal recognized the challenges of serving children with special needs and the merits of our case, so he extended the restraining order, which will allow the school to remain open for at least another year.

OCS is a charter unlike most others; it welcomes all students, including many with learning difficulties. In fact, more than 50 percent of OCS students have moderate to severe learning disabilities, 98 percent are either black or Hispanic, and nearly nine in ten students are eligible for meal assistance. But this is about more than just the numbers; there’s a reason why so many parents of disabled children send their kids here.

From day one at OCS, I knew we’d landed at the right place. The school works hard to foster a culture of understanding and inclusivity, and it translates into a healthy, supportive learning environment that runs seamlessly from sixth to twelfth grade. My youngest, a 7th grader, tells me, when someone in class doesn’t understand something, they all work together until everyone is on the same page and ready to move forward. In another instance, when my younger son was hospitalized for two months, not only did OCS teachers come after hours to help him keep up, but they also kept an extra eye out for my older son, a high school student, to check in and help him cope.

In threatening to close down OCS’s middle school and thrust students back into the public school system, the DOE is breaking up a school, compromising students’ futures and disrupting entire families. By viewing test scores in isolation every year, rather than over time, the Department is missing the larger picture. In fact, the graduation rate at OCS is only one percent lower than the citywide average, and students enrolled at OCS since middle school have matched or outperformed the graduation rates of similar students in the city for three out of the last four graduation cohorts.

In light of this, I fear OCS is being unfairly used as a proxy to fight a larger war on charter schools. The Mayor has long opposed charters, claiming they’re too exclusive. But if he shuts down OCS, he will be making an example of the wrong charter school and sending mixed messages to the rest.

OCS parents will continue with our discrimination suit against the city in order to keep our school open. We will take this fight as far as we can and use every tool we have to ensure that our children have a school where they feel comfortable to grow in a learning environment best suited to their needs.

Opportunity Charter School isn’t a just regular middle school or a high school; it is a singular institution that brings a unique, tailored education to many students that wouldn’t get one elsewhere. And in a city where many disabled and special needs students slip through the cracks, schools like OCS are more important than ever. We urge the DOE to think of our kids as the individuals they are, and not as a set of test scores.

* * * *Layta Downs is a Bronx mother who has sued the Department of Education over the proposed closure of Opportunity Charter School.